


Friction

by dollsome



Category: Reign (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-15
Updated: 2014-03-15
Packaged: 2018-01-15 20:50:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1318753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollsome/pseuds/dollsome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After “Dirty Laundry,” Henry has an epiphany. Catherine gets to hear about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Friction

**Author's Note:**

> I like to call this "The Feel-Good Saga Of What Might Have Been If Henry'd Gone Sensible Instead Of Bonkers After The Whole Sexed Out A Window Murder Cover-Up Romp."

  
Catherine has just finished undressing when there’s a knock on her door.  
  
“Who is it?”  
  
“Me.” Henry.  
  
 _Don’t open it._  
  
A wise thought, no doubt, but Catherine is exhausted and sore (wouldn’t you know, lugging a dead woman around the castle is hell on the arms and back) and so her wisdom isn’t precisely up to par.  
  
She glances in the mirror, wishing she hadn’t traded daytime attire for her nightdress. She looks far more woman than queen at the moment. Oh well. Nothing to be done about it now. She goes to greet her visitor.  
  
Henry is standing in the doorway. He opens his mouth as if he’s got something urgent to say, but then falls silent at the sight of her.  
  
The fool. He’s a liar when it suits him and for the most part an impressively terrible man, but she does believe in that look. He used to look at her like that when they were young.  
  
She tugs her robe up over her shoulder and avoids his gaze. “Really, Henry. I already told you—”  
  
He sighs, exasperated. The spell is broken. “I’m not here for that. Kenna left me well satisfied enough for the moment, thank you.”  
  
She scowls. “Then why are you ...”  
  
He has a certain air of panic about him, she realizes.  
  
An air very similar to yesterday’s.  
  
“Oh God, Henry, not another one,” she groans.  
  
In jest.  
  
Mostly.  
  
After a moment’s reflection she adds, quite sincerely, “Though I must admit, if you had to throw a second girl out the window, well – you chose more wisely this time.”  
  
“I didn’t  _do_  it.” He sits abruptly on her bed, his movements not unlike a petulant child’s.  
  
“But you thought about it.” She follows him to the bed, but stands beside it instead of sitting. She’s in the mood to tower over him.  
  
“No! Yes. A little. Briefly.”  
  
Wonderful.  
  
“And you’ve come to me to discuss it because?” she prods, irritated.  
  
He looks suddenly nervous. Quite a weak, vulnerable display for a king.  
  
It’s a delightful look on him – she won’t deny that – but she feels a flicker of apprehension beneath her enjoyment.  
  
“What if ...” he begins, then stops abruptly. He tries again: “—that is, I can’t help wondering if ...” He lets out a frustrated sigh. “—do you think it’s possible that—”  
  
“I’d like to sleep at some point tonight, if you don’t mind.”  
  
“—I’m too old for this,” he blurts out.  
  
“What?” Catherine asks in genuine surprise. If there’s one admission she has never expected from Henry, it’s that one.  
  
“I mean it. One girl after another. All of them young and wild and eager to please me.”  
  
“You poor dear.”  
  
“It’s exhausting. They’re never thoughtful, never interesting, always prattling on about suitors and dresses and  _themselves_ —”  
  
“Kenna?” Catherine surmises.  
  
“Kenna,” Henry sighs. “I am fond of the girl—”  
  
“At least parts of her, I’m sure.”  
  
“—but sometimes I think that I’d rather throw myself from the window than suffer through another word. And what of that! What if  _I’d_  been the one to fall?”  
  
“Then it would have been a fitting end,” Catherine says consolingly. “You’d have died as you lived – trousers down at the least appropriate time.”  
  
“Very funny.”  
  
She shrugs modestly.  
  
“God.” He buries his face in his hands. He looks so weary. It’s all a bit delicious. “What satisfaction is there in any of it?”  
  
“You’re asking me about satisfaction?”  
  
“I just mean—” He looks up at her, that young hopeful gleam in his eyes, and she knows that this will go nowhere good. “Don’t you wonder what it might have been like if we’d had a real marriage?”  
  
“Oh, I think our marriage is perfectly real,” she says, lofty.  
  
“You know what I mean. Built on companionship. Trust.” After a slightly too-long pause: “Love.”  
  
“You had that with Diane.”  
  
“Never mind Diane. I’m talking about you and me.”  
  
“We have our children. We’re allies when it suits us. It’s enough.”  
  
“Is it?”  
  
Impatient, she snaps, “What other choice have you given us?”  
  
As usual, his anger rises to meet hers. “Have  _I—_? You are the one who—”  
  
“Yes, yes, we went through all that months ago. It was my fault for failing to give you a son and then fearing you’d execute me over it. Clearly a completely unfounded worry, by the way; what a paranoid twit I was to think you would ever  _dream_  of having me executed—”  
  
“I wouldn’t have executed you  _then_. You weren’t nearly so annoying then.”  
  
“Ha!” She doesn’t mean to laugh, but it is the exact wrong thing to say, and so very  _Henry_  that it’s really not worth getting upset over.  
  
He seems placated by her laughter, sharp though it was.  
  
“Or so frightening,” he adds. She can tell it’s meant to be praise. In a strange way, she appreciates it.  
  
“So I’m a real threat?” she asks wryly.  
  
“My most dangerous opponent.”  
  
“Good.”  
  
She sits beside him. It  _is_  her bed. Still, she’s careful to leave room between them. And after a moment, she begins weaving her hair into a braid as a precautionary measure. Henry gets so maudlin when she takes her hair down. It’s better not to risk it.  
  
But this time, he doesn’t seem to notice. He’s lost in his ever so important kingly thoughts. “These girls—it’s like being bewitched. I want them, but once I’ve had them, it’s never enough.”  
  
“How could it be, for someone with the sexual prowess of a lion?” she mocks.  
  
He glares at her.  
  
“I’m sorry,” she says, not sorry in the slightest. “Go on.”  
  
“There’s nothing real there. There’s never been that...” He stops, gathering his thoughts. “It has never been the way it was when we were young. Those early days, and being with you ... the way it felt to watch you walk into a room ... I’ve never found that feeling again. Never once.”  
  
“You can’t recapture youth, Henry. Why are men always so bad at understanding that? And kings the worst of all.”  
  
He gazes at her, melancholy.  
  
It’s disconcerting. Something must be done, and teasing seems the best option. “So I don’t bewitch you? Despite having the devil at my beck and call? I think I’m offended.”  
  
“You ... wake me up. Remind me what it is to really live.”  
  
“Dear God. If I’d known you would get so sentimental about lugging around a corpse—”  
  
“You felt it too.” He squeezes her hand, affectionate. It’s inconveniently charming. “You had fun. Admit it.”  
  
“You ruined my coverlet.”  
  
“I’ll get you another. Now, admit it.”  
  
She almost does. His smiles have always been hard to resist.  
  
Just in time, she changes tactics. “Maybe it’s love.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Your recent affliction with Kenna.” She keeps her voice soft to ensure he pays attention. She would like these words to sink in. “Maybe it’s the mark of true devotion, as only you can feel it. You don’t like being under someone else’s power, and alas, that’s just what love always demands. So it’s your survival instinct. To eliminate the threat. Out the window with her.” After a moment, she can’t quite resist adding, “Or off with her head.”  
  
Henry isn’t smiling now.  
  
For a moment, she thinks she’s gone too far. Her husband does so hate to hear the truth.  
  
At last, eyes dark, he says, “I don’t love Kenna.”  
  
She wants to touch his face, and doesn’t. “I know.”  
  
They sit in silence. It quickly becomes unbearable. She arises in search of a ribbon for her hair.  
  
“Perhaps it was a little overwrought,” Henry says at last.  
  
“What was?” she asks, keeping her attention on the mirror instead of him as she ties off her braid.  
  
“‘The sexual prowess of a lion.’”  
  
She scoffs. “You only admit that now?”  
  
“I should have listened.”  
  
“Yes, you should have.”  
  
“Not that you were coming up with anything much better—”  
  
“A  _lion_ , Henry.”  
  
“Fine! You were right and I was wrong. Is that what you wish to hear?”  
  
“Daily for the rest of my life, if possible.”  
  
He laughs. Despite herself, she smiles.  
  
“There is,” Henry says, “one thing I can’t stop thinking about ...”  
  
“Oh really?” she asks, not as wary as she should be, and turns to face him again. “What?”  
  
Rather devilishly, he asks, “Are you up for another adventure, my queen?”  
  
  
+  
  
  
Bess yawns, thinking fondly of her bed and wishing the morning could greet her with some daylight, at least. It’s early enough that it’s still practically black as night—but there’s laundry to be done, as always, and laundry waits for no servant girl. She will never understand how these clean, lovely people can dirty so many clothes. And that’s not even to mention the sheets—  
  
Her heart quickens, interrupting her thoughts.  
  
There are voices coming from the depths of the room.  
  
“But how do they do it? Surely it’s not just water—”  
  
“It’s soap, it’s water and soap—”  
  
“But how does it  _work_? You’ve hundreds of tinctures at your disposal, and you still can’t get the hang of it?”  
  
“You put the soap onto it and it – and it works.”  
  
“Oh really? Then why hasn’t it done anything?”  
  
“Obviously, it’s going to require a bit of friction—”  
  
“Your Majesties!”  
  
The King and Queen of France freeze.  
  
Bess could swear the King hides something white behind his back.  
  
As if that isn’t strange enough, they’re both dressed in their nightclothes.  
  
Bess belatedly remembers to curtsey. She asks the floor, “What is ... how might I assist—”  
  
“The King’s doublet is missing,” Queen Catherine says briskly. “The crimson one with the gold embroidery. He requires it. Urgently.”  
  
Urgent it must be indeed, for the two of them to be down here before dawn. Bess didn’t even know that royals  _knew_  about the pre-dawn hours, considering how they like to sleep right through them. “It’s—it’s not here, Your Majesty.”  
  
“What do you mean?” the queen says, with such icy authority that it chills Bess’s bones.  
  
“I—it’s in his wardrobe. I’m sure of it.”  
  
“Very well,” the queen says briskly. “I suppose we shall have to look again. Come, Henry.”  
  
Bess watches them go and wonders vaguely if she’s dreaming.  
  
She wonders even harder when she notices they’ve left a decanter of red wine behind.  
  
The King and Queen of France getting drunk over laundry – who’d have thought?  
  
Bess pinches herself. “Ouch!”  
  
She is still not entirely convinced of the realness of things.  
  
  
+  
  
  
They remain appropriately stern and royal until they’re out of the laundry; then the empty corridors ring with their laughter.  
  
“Oh dear,” Catherine says once she’s recovered. “I hope they won’t be missing that.”  
  
“I’m a thief,” Henry says, staring at the frilly white chemise in his hand. It’s covered in red wine stains. (‘Not quite blood,’ Henry had said when they set out, decanter and goblets in hand, ‘but good enough for our purposes.’)  
  
“A minor offense,” Catherine says airily.  
  
“That depends. God, I hope it’s not Kenna’s.”  
  
“Besides, you were the one feeling experimental.”  
  
“It’s a shame we were interrupted. I think we were really getting somewhere.”  
  
“Were we?” Catherine surveys the ruined chemise. “I doubt it.”  
  
“Oh, I don’t know,” he says roguishly. “I’m very curious to hear what it was you were going to say about friction.”  
  
Catherine stares at him, lifting an eyebrow.  
  
“No good? I thought that one was rather clever.”  
  
“Better than the lion of sexual prowess,” she admits, “but believe me, that’s not high praise.”  
  
“Then tell me, Your Majesty,” Henry says, smirking at her, “what must a man do to earn your high praise?”  
  
The wine has set her blood singing, just a little, and she decides it can’t hurt too much to flirt a bit. If he gets too insufferable down the line, she can always poison him.  
  
So she stops walking and rests her hand on his arm, leaning in close. He leans down expectantly. She can just make out the lines of his handsome face in the dark. His mouth is curved in a smile.  
  
Close enough to kiss him, she murmurs, “Work for it.”  
  
Then she pulls away abruptly and continues down the hall. If her heart is racing, well—she blames the wine.  
  
Behind her, Henry chuckles. Then there comes the welcome sound of his footsteps following after her, determined to catch up.

 


End file.
